Captain Jackson's Historic Chocolate Shop and the Printing Office of Edes and Gill

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Located at 21 Unity Street, behind the Old North Church in the heart of the North End of Boston, The Printing Shop of Edes and Gill and Captain Jackson’s Historic Chocolate Shop, are two living history programs which, while occupying a single historic structure, have taken the principles of living history and historic education in new direction. 

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Clough House, a structure built in 1712 and occupied by Ebenezer Clough, a Master Mason who helped build Old North Church, is a structure that now serves as the site of two living history programs.[1]  While free and opened to the public The Printing Shop of Edes and Gill portrays the art of eighteenth century printing, while Jackson’s Historic Chocolate Shop hosted an interactive historic exhibit which focuses on eighteenth century foodways with particular emphasis placed on the consumption of chocolate.  Opened under the auspices of the Old North Church, these two living history exhibits occupy the first floor of the Clough House where docents and historical interpreters dressed in eighteenth century attire serve free sample of eighteenth century drinking chocolate.[2]  While guests enjoy these free samples of chocolate, the docent dove into great detail regarding the significance of the chocolate trade to the city of Boston, and the involvement of Captain Newark Jackson and his Amey Jackson, in the Boston Chocolate trade during the eighteenth century.  More importantly the docent made it clear, that from a historic standpoint, the consumption of chocolate has greatly evolved over the centuries, and that chocolate was consumed in the eighteenth century predominately as a beverage often infused with spices and consisted of a much lower sugar content in comparison to modern forms of chocolate.[3]

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

After this brief lesson on eighteenth century chocolate, guests are then encouraged to enter the connecting room where they can see a journeyman at work producing historically accurate prints and illustrations.  The Printing Shop of Edes and Gill, opened April 15, 2011, with the objective of not only portraying the craft of eighteenth century printing, but also in hope that this, “colonial print shop can again be a meeting place for visitors and groups where they can gather and hear the stories of regular citizens who came together in 1775 in defense of their rights and who created a nation.”[4] 

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Following the acquisition of The Boston Gazette and Country Journal by Benjamin Edes and John Gill on April 7, 1755, this print shop would come to be very politically active as hostilities between the British Government and the residents of Boston eventually escalated into armed conflict.  This revolutionary legacy and the role The Printing Shop of Edes and Gill played in the formation of this legacy is alive and well as the docents continue to produce copies of the Boston Edition of the Declaration of Independence and Paul Revere’s Boston Massacre Print, and a variety of other publications that circulated Boston during this time of great social and political change.

As stated by historians such as Carl Bidenbaugh, the printing trade was a vital weapon during this time of great political and social upheaval in eighteenth century New England, and printers such as John Gill and Benjamin Edes were patriots of  “clear-thinking and bold captains, who crystallized their discontent, formulated plans, and joined with other groups in precipitating the revolutionary movement.”[5]  As a result, the printer docents not only explained that the documents and illustrations they are currently producing and selling represent the political and social atmosphere that existed in Boston during this time, and that the trade itself was a risky venture and that, “income from subscriptions and commercial advisements was seldom sufficient to sustain a newspaper, [and] public printing supplied the margin between success and failure.”[6]  

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Furthermore, The Printing Shop of Edes and Gill and Captain Jackson’s Historic Chocolate Shop within the Clough House are two hidden treasures within the North End which are not only keeping history alive but are shedding light on two important aspects or eighteenth century history, the consumption of food, and the consumption of information.  From an educational standpoint this approach to history is not only stimulating from an a sensory standpoint, but also as breathes light into the historiography itself.        

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[1] The Printing Office of Edes and Gill, “About,” Lessons On Liberty, http://bostongazette.org/about/ (accessed October 29, 2015).

[2] Old North Church. “The Printing Office of Edes and Gill/ Captain Jackson’s Historic Chocolate Shop” (Guided Tour of the Historic Site, North End Boston, MA, October 29, 2015).

[3] From The Hearth and Home of Newark Jackson, “For All Your Chocolate and Colonial Musing,” Captain Jackson’s Historic Chocolate Shop, https://mrsnewarkjackson.wordpress.com (accessed October 29, 2015).

[4] The Printing Office of Edes and Gill, http://bostongazette.org/about/ (accessed October 29, 2015).

[5] Richard L. Merritt, “Public Opinion in Colonial America: Content-Analyzing the Colonial Press.” The Public Opinion Quarterly vol. 27, no. 3 (Autumn 1963), http://www.jstor.org/stable/2747114 (accessed September 12, 2015), 361.

[6] O.M. Dickerson, “British Control of American Newspapers on the Ever of the Revolution.” The New England Quarterly vol. 24, no. 4 (December 1951), http://www.jstor.org/stable/361338 (accessed September 13, 2015), 453.